Inferring from the context, the English translation of the given sentence would be: “A resident from San Martino delle Scale: ‘The flames were chasing us down.'”

Last Updated: July 25, 2023

#Palermo
“For many years, I have been living in San Martino delle Scale and I have never witnessed anything like this. We were surrounded by flames and spent the night in the square along with a thousand other residents who were forcibly evacuated. It seemed like the flames were chasing us.” Luigi Migliore, along with his wife and two children, experienced endless moments of terror last night as their house was threatened by the wildfires in the Monreale mountains where the fraction is located. The family stayed in their car throughout the night. “Did we sleep? Absolutely not. We were afraid. We were abandoned. The fires started at five in the afternoon. First, there was one from Bellolampo that the wind blew towards us. This front of fire merged with the one coming from Pioppo. It was a circle of hell that tightened its grip on the fraction of San Martino. At one twenty in the morning, we were forced to leave and found ourselves in the square with flames, ashes, and unbearable heat. Something that had never happened before occurred this year. Every year, with the sirocco wind, we know that the risk of fire is very likely. But every time, firefighters, forest rangers, and civil protection would come. The fire was confronted. This time, there was nothing,” adds Migliore. “We saw one fire truck and two tankers from the metropolitan city, and that was it. We couldn’t escape. The roads towards Palermo and Monreale were blocked by flames and the electricity poles had been melted by the fires.” They were trapped and at the mercy of the flames until the next morning. “In San Martino, having just one fire truck with the inferno that was happening was too little,” Migliore adds. “The damage was extensive. Many were only able to come down in the morning and found refuge in the homes of friends and relatives. Some pizzerias and establishments were saved because the cooks, pizza makers, waiters, and owners used makeshift hoses and buckets to fight the flames, miraculously saving the premises. In the morning, we hoped for aerial intervention, but we didn’t see any aircraft until one o’clock.” “Unbelievable. These fires are certainly intentional, as they always have been. But I don’t remember ever having temperatures of 38 degrees Celsius in the evening and 31 degrees at night in San Martino delle Scale. Here in the mountains, there is always a ten-degree difference compared to Palermo.”